Linux, PostgreSQL, Pentaho BI, Python,Django, Data Visualization and other entertainments that I indulge myself with, when I can't sleep.

Monday, January 17, 2011

12 million and counting

WPA TKIP. Still testing my Backtrack distribution and particularly some tools to crack the WPA TKIP protocol. First I've captured a valid four way handshake, and now I'm using a dictionary attack which has tested already about 12 million combinations of keys but still no luck. What comes to mind while doing these experiments is the importance of selecting strong passwords within those protocols that use passphrases, in this instance I chose a random password of 20 characters and my dictionary weights 2gb. It would be faster if Beto lent me the Artificial Intelligence server with its 16 cores but knowing him, I bet he would laugh it up at my face.

Skinner box. I'm learning about the Skinner approach to conditioning, some very eerie stuff. Just imagine, putting a child of yours inside a box for a prolonged period , isolated carefully from the environment and controlling it the internally, if he starts crying you turn down the temperature, the poor creature gets cold and stops crying...the temperature normalizes, the kid learns not to cry, this is as spooky as it gets. I learned also about Pavlov, and another evil bastard called John B. Watson who conditioned another poor kid to fear any thing with fur, even synthetic materials resembling fur. Those were the first steps into conditioning of human behavior, more advanced techniques are now into use.

Day dreaming. I'm working with an idea I learned by a third party regarding the power of day dreaming, the intent is to construct a stronger relationship with one's inner world. Several beautiful insights have resulted from apparently random visualizations from day dreaming which is said to be the seed of most creative endeavors. What would happen if we had more control over those random dreams? The theory is that we would be more intelligent, I don't know whether is true, but I have nothing to loose if I engage in the challenge.

Success by imitation. Another idea that is giving me time to think is success by imitation which consists of being observant of those characteristics that are common in people who have had success in what they do and imitate them ; it's a recurrent idea in the so called "self help" literature and it's nothing more than common sense, though most of us disregard this fact.

I've given myself this week to dominate the peg-word system of memory, I intent to make it my second nature.

Words of the day:spüren -> to feel, (the same as fühlen)verblasst -> faded, dimdurchschauen -> to look throughgetzählt -> numbered, limited ( from "zahlen")